The misery of trying to find apartment in sweden

But everybody seems happy.

I will try to post as many articles in this thread, showing an idea what it means housing in sweden and the precarious rental market that is going on in sweden where people live in short term accommodation of 1 year or less contracts and in order to have better rental security they need to join a massive queue that can takes 5 to 10 years.

Of course, you will never hear too much about that subject because they need to keep it quiet otherwise nobody will move to sweden. Specially second hand rentals are precarious and prone to scams with fake contracts and overpriced rentals.

Believe me any links I post can't make it any justice to what is actually happening in sweden.

Yea, housing is handled very strange here in Sweden. My wife has been in the queue system for over a year now and still doesn't have enough points to ever get first choice on a place. Her uncle just bought an apartment instead of waiting as he moved from another city. But hey, at least they're affordable. In my country you can find an apartment just by going online or talking to friends or Co workers. But they're very expensive, our apartment was a 1 bedroom with a living room and kitchen room. That was 2,000$ US a month XD Another 400$ for electrical and 110$ for 8Mb internet lol.

Yea, housing is handled very strange here in Sweden. My wife has been in the queue system for over a year now and still doesn't have enough points to ever get first choice
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Yea, housing is handled very strange here in Sweden. My wife has been in the queue system for over a year now and still doesn't have enough points to ever get first choice on a place. Her uncle just bought an apartment instead of waiting as he moved from another city. But hey, at least they're affordable. In my country you can find an apartment just by going online or talking to friends or Co workers. But they're very expensive, our apartment was a 1 bedroom with a living room and kitchen room. That was 2,000$ US a month XD Another 400$ for electrical and 110$ for 8Mb internet lol.
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In Spain I go to a website among the dozens available. I don't have to pay anything at all to become a member, not monthly fee, nada. I call the landlord, there is no 100+ per apartment or anything like that. I can get 1 year contract that is extended indefinitely. Not like in sweden where most second hand rentals are 1 year or less in most cases.In Spain There are plenty of long term rentals, no queues, no recommendation letters, no black market.

It might take 1 month tops but I get a long term place and if you want to live outside the city then it is even cheaper, I can pay €300 for 70m2 in my country outside the city. No stresses because it is not short term second hand like in sweden.

As you can see I come from a relatively poor region of Spain, despite it I have never heard of queues or housing shortages as I see in Sweden.

Now we are having some issues due to excess of turists but the situation won't get to the levels of sweden. We are not like them.

Never had to pay in order to see apartments. If I want to buy an apartment in Spain, it is first to come first to get it. No private auditions like in sweden where price get hiked.

In Sweden I talk to second hand landlords who tell me they get 100+ emails per apartment and they can't simply reply them all. The tell me the situation is very serious and people have to leave sweden because the can't find rental and despite I don't have many friends I hear many times of people paying for a first hand rental to skip the queue. That is the black market.

I am sorry but the stuff I see in sweden, I have never experienced in Spain ever in my life.

Swedes are constantly reminding me that they are a superior culture that their system is better. But then I struggle to find accommodation even outside the city, I am still in the queue to find an apartment after more than 3 years!!.

My family in Spain can't believe it, they think I am joking. They are not rich or posh and despite it they never heard of queues for rentals or second hand market.

Sweden is marketing. The sweden we see on the documentaries has nothing to do with life in sweden for an immigrant. Life in sweden is TOUGH. Sweden is not an easy country and Spain despite the precarious job market is very easy to find a place and live there for a long time. Sweden is only excuses and restrictions.

Sweden is a country almost empty, and despite it we queue for apartments, I heard of people who had to queue to even get a parking spot!!!.

Spain sucks at jobs, really it does. In fact we have one of the most precarious job markets in Europe. But let me tell you, I don't see the fakery, the arrogance, the cynical attitude I see in sweden.

If I was rich I wouldn't live in sweden. Because this is passive repression. Sometimes I feel like if sweden was some sort of passive dictatorship were nobody is free to be themselves. Where somehow we are being watched for everything we do.

People can think whatever they want. Sweden is quiet and nice because it's nature everywhere but the system is a prison, there is no mobility for anything.

Sorry, I wish I could be more positive. Worst part is I spent €20000 in this country because we got a job and we didn't know about the housing thing. My partner spent a lot of money trying to find second hand... Crazy stuff.

Why on earth did you choose Sweden rather than the UK? Some of us have made the same comments here for at least 10 years - didn't you do any research?

Because the job was in sweden. That's the only reason.

We never thought it was this hard to find apartment let alone we had no idea about the second hand market. Also let's be honest there is barely no info about what actually is second hand rentals. That's why sweden keep it so quiet about it.

I am thinking moving to the UK but I need to save money, find a job there. Also brexit is coming so more uncertainty.

I only see restrictions in sweden. Way too many. housing, excuses with jobs, it's just for the hype sweden has, living in sweden is way too difficult unless you are rich and can buy an apartment.

Well, my advice pepitoAndalucia is to get out as soon as you can. I stayed for 14 years for family reasons and now I have my life back again.

Try to find work where you can work anywhere and sell your service or product online. Then you have real freedom.

We are thinking to buy a retirement apartment in Spain and maybe to make a business there - salaries are low and you can hire very talented and motivated people. Like France and Italy, people know how to live and smell the roses.

The Uk will not disappear because of Brexit. The main issue for you will be how they manage EU citizens, but if you leave it too late then you may not get in.

The housing situation there if you want to buy is shitty too, and there is little protection from landlords. So you can find that you have to move every 6 months.

But in the UK, everyone is judged on what they can do. Many immigrants made a lot of money and successful companies - unlike in Sweden where you will hit glass ceilings.

If you could learn German, consider there - they are so afraid of their past that they give immigrants from the EU lots of possibilities. But this does depend on what job you want to do - many require a German apprenticeship.

As you have not emigrated to Sweden and don't even live in Europe, let me explain.

If as a European you move to Italy, Spain, France or Germany, you can expect to need to learn the language, but as a European you also expect to be treated in a fair way. That is what Europe, like the USA is all about.

The problem is that Sweden does not obey normal rules or preconceptions. Worse it promotes itself as a humanitarian and open, modern country but in reality what the government projects is not the reality or position of the average Swede

So people move to this country. At first they think that their failure to advance is due to language. So they spend 4 or 5 years to become near fluent, to then realise that they cannot advance or get a job.

Why do you think that such bitterness exists in this forum, compared to the local in German where people bitch, but are overall happy?

So please do not tell us, who went through the shit - what Sweden is or not. Or that we should have done x, y or z. Swedes are fucked and when they are pissed, many will admit it.

They are the Japanese of Europe and no-one else will really understand them.

The harsh realities of life are really plain and simple, the grass is greener, etc.. NOT!!!

But some here when they realize what they have ventured into, reality becomes apparent and they denigrate the people and the country that they themselves chose to become part of because it is not like where they came from...

People who have been successful in their acceptance of the way things really are and are getting along and happily adjust to their new home do not post here...

To assume that Sweden is like the rest of Europe is off base. In fact, this whole EU thing has been doomed from the start because the Germans don't trust the Poles, the Poles don't trust the Germans, the Spaniards are lazy, the Greeks are worse, the Italians are crooks, the French don't like anybody, etc...

Each country has its own traditions and predjudices that date way,way back and are not changed easily. That's why this New World Order, One World crap is never gonna fly IMHO.

Gamla does oft spout to defend a system he doesn't know, doesn't understand and has little-to-no experience of.

It's his thing, it's what he does.

And this is a man who cultivates his "knowledge" of things from a fat stack of Reader's Digest, carefully placed next to his shitter, the special place his incontinence requires he spend most of his time.